Oliver von Bohlen und Halbach gained his PhD in biology at the University of Constance, Germany. He carried out his postdoctoral training at the Medical Faculty, Charité of the Humboldt-University in Berlin (Director Professor U. Heinemann). Since 2001 he is postdoctoral fellow at the Interdisciplinary Center for Neurosciences (Director Professor K. Unsicker) at the Medical Faculty of the University of Heidelberg, Germany.

Rolf Dermietzel obtained his MD in 1970 at the Medical School Essen, Germany, where he continued his training, being appointed as Associate Professor 1976. In 1984 he started a research fellowship at the California Institute of Technology, Pasadena (supervisor Dr. J.-P. Revel) followed by a position as Visiting Professor at the Albert-Einstein College of Medicine, New York, in 1988. One year later he became Chairman of the Institute of Anatomy at the University of Regensburg, Germany, and in 1998 Chairman of the Institute of Anatomy at the University of Bochum, Germany.